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22 FIRST NEWS OF THE GREAT CALAMITY."The town of Alvin was practically demolished. Hitchcocksuffered severely from the storm, while the little town ofAlta Loma is reported without a house standing. The town ofPearl has lost one-half of its buildings."L. B. Carlton, the president of the Business League ofAlvin, and a prominent merchant there, reports that not a build-iing is left standing in the town, either residence or business. iStocks of goods and house furniture are ruined, and cropsare a total loss. Alvin is a town of about 1200 inhabitants.SANTA FE TRAIN BLOWN FROM THE TRACK."The Santa Fe train which left here at 7.55 Saturday night,the 8th, was wrecked at a point about two miles north of Alvin.The train was running slowly when it encountered the heavystorm. It is reported that the train was literally lifted from thetrack. "A thrilling story was told by two men who floated acrossfrom Galveston to the mainland. It came in the form of a telegramreceived at Dallas f-om Houston:" Relief train just returned. They could not get closer thansix miles of Virginia Point, where the prairie was covered withlumber, debris, pianos, trunks, and dead bodies. Two hundredcorpses were counted from the train. A large steamer is strandedtwo miles this side of Virginia Point, as though thrown up by atidal wave. Nothing can be seen of Galveston." Two men were picked up who floated across to the mainland,who say they estimate the loss of life up to the time they left at2000."The above message was addressed to Superintendent Felton,Dallas, and comes from Mr. Vaughn, manager of the WesternUnion office at Houston. The Missouri, Kansas and Texas northbound " flyer" was reported wrecked near Sayers.The office of the Western Union Telegraph Company at St.Louis was besieged with thousands of inquiries as to the extentand result of tile terrible storm that cut off Galveston from communicationwith the rest of the world. Rumors of the most dire-